


What I Keep and What I Carry

by poisontaster



Series: Heart 'Verse [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Future Fic, M/M, Permanent Injury, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-04-11
Updated: 2006-04-11
Packaged: 2018-05-12 10:59:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5663725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poisontaster/pseuds/poisontaster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam and Dean's map of their future.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What I Keep and What I Carry

**Author's Note:**

> This story marks the bridge between the Every Broken Thing universe and the Heart 'Verse, an AU far-future series of stories.

The first year, they almost break apart a million times, paralyzed by the stress and taboo of what they're doing. Sam's still angry and resentful at times at the loss of 'normal', especially on the days it feels like his head is breaking open; Dean is angry about everything else. They both feel guilty and they're both afraid of what'll happen if Dad finds out. Their fucks are fast and frantic as if they can outrun the consequences of what they're doing. On the day—because neither one of them would do anything so silly as call it an anniversary—Sam gets Dean drunk and jumps him. They don't leave the room for two days. When they're finally gearing up to move on, Sam comes out of the shower and finds his old sneakers with the peeling soles and frayed laces have been replaced by expensive, durable brand new ones, left in the exact same place as the old ones. Neither one of them mentions it.

The second year, Dean gets hurt and they spend nearly every waking moment fighting about hunting, but there's never any question of whether Sam will leave…or even where he'll sleep. He spends most nights curled as tight around Dean as he can manage, getting all manner of knees and elbows in sensitive places. Dean is irritable—which is not that big a change—but in the middle of the night, he'll curl into Sam, clinging to Sam's arms so hard they go numb. Sam spends fifteen minutes or more every morning shaking the blood back into them, but he never says anything to Dean.

The third year, _Sam_ gets hurt, and they alternate between Dean being stuck between his shoulder blades and Dean starting fights with him, trying to make him angry, trying to make him leave. They finally have it out in a rest stop in Tennessee, an actual fistfight, slip-sliding in the mud and missing just as often as they connect. They end up flat on their backs, covered in it and laughing and Dean says gruffly, "Well. I guess you're back to normal then." And then they both are.

There's no lightning bolt. It doesn't happen suddenly, but Sam clearly remembers waking up one night sometime in their fourth year and realizing that, although he still thinks of Dean as his brother, that definition has expanded and evolved to encompass so much more than he ever thought it could. That Dean is his brother and his lover both and it's not weird anymore, it's just a logical conclusion to something that always was, if they'd only been able to see it. Sam remembers reaching out and running his fingertips over Dean's skin, and Dean's eyes opening to blink sleepy and confused into his. _It's nothing,_ Sam had said. _It's fine_. And Dean closed his eyes again. Because Dean believed him.

The fifth year is when Dean loses his eye. It's a bad, ugly year for both of them. Dean wants to soldier on like nothing's happened and nothing Sam says will change his mind. It's not until Sam steps in front of Dean's knife practice and demonstrates just how off Dean's aim and reflexes are that Dean concedes the point. They winter in Texas and Sam takes a job on a ranch while Dean pulls himself together. Nights, Dean traces the scar on Sam's shoulder and mutters, "You stupid fucker. You stupid, stupid fucker." But really, it's the scar Sam's most proud of.

Year six is rocky; the loss of Dean's eye puts Sam at the front of things more often which makes Dean worry and makes Dean insecure. They barely touch and they barely talk, for months at a time. So much of Dean's identity is tied up in this; more than Sam would have ever expected. He doesn't know what's going to happen when Dean just _can't_ do this anymore and that worries him. In between his case research, Sam searches frantically for something—anything—he can offer Dean as a life in return for this one, when the time comes. If they don't die. If Dean doesn't die. Because Dean can't die. He just…can't.

Dean leaves him in what would have been their seventh year. Just…leaves. Sam wakes up one morning to a barbiturate headache that makes him want to curl up and die and an empty motel room. There's an envelope with a bus ticket to California and some money. There isn't even a note, which is just…so fucking Dean that Sam puts his fist through a wall. When he kicks over the wastebasket, he finds half a dozen sheets from the hotel notepad, crumpled up. When he flattens them out, they're full of half started sentences and violent cross outs. Sam thinks he can make out the words _I'm sorry_ , but that could only be wishful thinking. He goes to California and visits Jessica's grave for the first time in years and cries. Then he goes to find Dean.

In the end, Dean finds him. Eight months of looking and always _just_ missing him. Then one day, he just turns around and Dean is there, balanced on the balls of his feet like he's just waiting for the signal to flee. A thousand things go through Sam's mind, but he doesn't say any of them. He can't, his throat shut on anything resembling words. But he holds out his hand, and after a moment of long hard looking, Dean reaches out and takes it. The eighth year is one of the best years of Sam's life and he spends every moment of it showing Dean why they can never do this again.

As if to make up for the sweetness of the previous year, they both damn near die early in year nine. Three weeks in the hospital for Sam, damn near three _months_ for Dean. At the end of it, they're both pale, shaky and too many pounds lighter. The mother of the girl they saved takes them in; a big drafty farmhouse surrounded by miles of untouched forest. Dean has physical therapy three times a week, which Sam drives him to, because Dean's leg isn't well enough to run the gas and the clutch. Sam's shattered arm aches for hours afterwards, but it's better than watching Dean fuck himself up even more.

"You have to stop," Sam tells him in the winter of their tenth year. They're huddled together under the quilts and the night's cold enough that Sam can see his breath even indoors. Sam traces the ugly puckered weals of Dean's scarred leg over and over, telling Dean through touch what he can't say aloud: _I'm not leaving. I still want you. I love you. I'm still here._ But on this other issue, he can't let himself budge. "You're going to get yourself killed and I can't…I can't have it. So you have to stop." Dean doesn't say no, but he doesn't say yes, either.

"And do what instead?" Dean asks him one day when the apple blossoms are falling but before the hard buds start to show. They've tried to leave twice, but Ellen—Sarah's mother—won't hear of it. They've taken up all her chores out of sheer desperation. "I don't know," Sam admits, not looking. "I can do more of the hunting…" Dean shakes his head. "No. It's got to be both of us. But I have an idea." And to Sam's amazement, Dean does. A mission. A school. It's what Sam was looking for, all this time, and Dean did it on his own. At Sam's incredulous look, Dean looks sheepish. "Well, even _I'm_ not going to live forever, dude." Sam puts his arms around Dean and buries his face against the nape of Dean's neck and says, "Fucking liar." They hit the road again, despite Ellen's protests. They both badly need to get back into shape and there's only so much they can do sparring against each other. It shocks Sam, how much he's missed this; the open road with Dean. Dean is happy too; happier than he's been in months. Bloodied, tired, covered in niter and ectoplasm, they still can't keep their hands off each other and the eleventh year is a miracle, a joy and a wonder he can barely comprehend.

They pull out Dean's papers again, and it's Sam's turn to be shocked all over. ("Budget projections? You did _budget projections_? Are these…are these building specs?") This is more than an idle fancy; Dean has thought about this. A lot. And for much longer than he's let on; Sam can track Dean's thoughts across the years by the types and colors of the paper, the names of the hotels and bars, little stickmen doodles of vampires and gremlins. He thinks if he hadn't already, he would fall for Dean because of this, quirky and cock-eyed and far smarter than anyone would think. Year twelve is the year of falling in love all over again, the year of dreams, and when the day comes—because they still don't call it an anniversary—Sam has an idea of his own.

If it has to have a name, then the thirteenth year is the year of surprises. It's the year they pass through Streator, Illinois—a first for Sam, but apparently not for Dean. It's the year they find out about Chance, and Chance's six year old daughter Chelsea, who's got Dean's freckles and nose, and a chubby cast to her face that tells Sam in another seven or so years she's going to suddenly sprout like a weed and be unable to sleep properly for months because the pain. She's got Mom's smile—which Sam saw once and only once and has never forgotten—and when Chelsea grins at him like that, Sam can't even feel angry at Dean. The thirteenth year is the year Missouri dies, it's the year Ellen dies, and they go back to the only place they've lived and loved enough to really call home.

It turns out Ellen was once the wife of a governor, and a woman of not-inconsiderable means. The thirteenth year turns into the fourteenth while they unravel the intricacies of Ellen's estate, while Sam works in secret to bring the rest of Dean's dream to life. Ellen gives them the land, with Sarah's blessings; it remains to them to find the money and the way. That was where Dean always foundered, but the truth is Dean's never known how many friends he—they—have, has never calculated how many debts would be gratefully repaid, given the opportunity. Where Dean has collected the names and weaknesses of monsters, Sam has a journal of names, phone numbers and email addresses. Dean carries the death count; Sam's always kept the life tally. But in the end, even Sam is surprised how easy it is. They all know what lies in the dark; it seems like all this time everyone's just been waiting for someone to shine a light. Even better is the look on Dean's face that night, when Sam tells him. Sam thinks it might be the best present he's ever been able to give Dean.

They have students before they even really have a school. Marcus shows up on their doorstep at three in the morning on a Tuesday, his two sisters in tow. "Can you…can you show us how to kill them?" he asks, and holds out a blurry photograph of the things that used to be their parents. Sam looks back at Dean, further back in the hallway with the shotgun and Dean says, "Yeah. We can. Come in." A week later, Emma and Deacon. A month later, Sarah—who acts as their lawyer—brings in Hari. Sam knows Dean calls Chance and Chelsea at least three times a week; he knows because _he_ calls them at least as often himself, though they both do it in secret and pretend not to know. It takes a fair amount of Sam's persuasive skills and a lot of negotiating, but for their fifteenth year, Sam gives Dean his daughter and in return, Dean gives him a home.

Sam spends their sixteenth year in a bit of a funk. He believes in Dean, believes in the school, and the necessity of it. The monsters are not gone. They're never gone, and in one sense, Dad had been right—sometimes the best thing you can do for someone who's seen the monsters is to put a gun in their hand and teach them to fight back. But… Even after everything, it wasn't _his_ dream. Sam doesn't even know what his dreams are anymore. He says as much to Chance—who's really not bad once you get past the whole 'fucked Dean' part—and she looks at him, puts a hand on his shoulder and says, "Then maybe you should figure that out, Sam." Dean knows something's wrong; of course he does. It shouldn't surprise Sam after all this time, but it does, and when Dean curls in behind him one night and whispers, "What is it, baby?" Sam feels something welling up in him half like panic and half like tears. "I don't know," he says, choking. "I don't know." And Dean holds him, murmuring, "It's okay. Shh. It's okay. We'll figure it out." And Sam believes him. Because Dean always does.

The seventeenth year passes in something of a blur. As if in response to Sam's crisis of faith, his visions quadruple and they don't have enough people to cover everything. Dean wants to go with him, but the school is still too new, needs him too much. Sam's legs ache all the time from too little legroom on planes and in rented cars and he lives on fast food and naproxen. Dean, Chelsea and Chance and even some of the kids call him all the time, but it's not the same. Finally Dean flies—flies!—out to Oklahoma City and meets him. "No more," Dean says, his forehead resting against Sam's, his fingers cupping Sam's face. Sam's hand is locked on Dean's elbow and he feels like he'll never be able to let go. "No more. We'll find someone else. Come home." There's forty people waiting for them at the airport when they get home, with a banner and balloons and Chelsea flings herself into his legs so hard they both fall down.

Sam wakes up suddenly a few days before his fortieth birthday and thinks: _This is what it is._

And it is. And it's enough.


End file.
